Chris McClelland introduces his novel, Contrition: A Novel of Healing and Redemption (Provo Canyon Press).
What started out ten years ago as an idea for a novella for a YA audience has grown and deepened into a full-bodied novel directed at an adult audience with a mature subtext. What does it mean to survive the trauma of combat? How does that square with Christian beliefs such as those found in the Bible and the Book of Mormon? What could spirits on the other side of the veil tell us about such things?
The novella appeared in print a few years back, and a reviewer in this publication (Conor Hilton) pointed out that certain themes in the story of the novella needed deeper investigation.
Five years later, the result is Contrition: A Novel of Healing and Redemption, a very “grown-up” book. I found that the only way for the main character to truly come to terms with his sins during the war was to make amends to a person to whom he had done the ultimate harm, much like a recovering alcoholic who had deeply wronged a good friend would seek to heal the wounds he inflicted when in the grips of his spiritual disease. This is a book that takes sin and redemption very seriously, in a very high stakes tale of life and death. It does so with the depictions of the real questions raised in the paragraphs above regarding morals and ethics. The following is an excerpt from the novel.
The time in the hospital left Hyrum with a lot of time to think, especially about his actions during the war. He had had nothing against Germans. On his mother’s side he had had some German in him anyway. The Germans as a people he didn’t think of as innately evil. They had just been the designated enemy so the Army had demanded he fight and kill them, just as they had tried awfully hard to kill him. And they nearly succeeded. Then he thought of all the battles in the Bible, and the Book of Mormon. But the recent war had been different than those ancient ones. Different from any battles at all. It was unbelievably easy to kill now, and on a massive scale. Millions had died in this war to end all wars.
At night, without Leigh, had been the worst part of the day. An anguished dark time without light. When she started visiting at night, he couldn’t help but talk to Leigh during those times. He tried not to burden her too much. Since he awoke from his coma he could not find a good night’s sleep. He chased it like a famished man would chase food. Before too long, he began to fear sleep, which triggered his insomnia. Sleep felt too much like the coma, or what he supposed death would be like. Some nights he was afraid if he drifted off he’d never wake up.
If you have ever searched your soul sitting in Sacrament Meeting after the passing of bread and water and found yourself in a deep searching soul conversation with God about some sin, large or small, you may have done in the past week or month or year, you may find Contrition an interesting and enriching read.
Book description:
Sections of this book have won awards from the National Veterans’ Administration and before this book, other works by Chris McClelland regarding war have been praised by combat veterans for the authentic depictions of warfare’s irrevocable wounds. Never having been in combat himself, McClelland has spent time in military service with the Air Force in the 1980s. And after, he witnessed the effects of combat for years as close personal friends at the VA Medical Treatment Center shared horrific experiences with him that are beyond adequate words.